FIG. 1A is a plan view showing a conventional file sheet for filing four 3.5 inch floppy discs. The file sheet 1 is formed by a mold of hard plastic, and in the file sheet 1 are provided four substantially square compartments 2 which are parted by a frame 3 formed along four side edges of the sheet and lateral and longitudinal partitions 4 and 5.
The lateral partition 4 is formed in the center portion of the file sheet 1 in the lateral direction to separate the file sheet 1 into upper and lower .portions and the longitudinal partition 5 is formed in the center portion of the file sheet 1 in the longitudinal direction to separate the file sheet 1 into right and left portions. That is to say, each compartment 2 is surrounded by a half of a lateral side 3a of the frame 3, a half of a longitudinal side 3b of the frame 3, a half of the lateral partition 4 and a half of the longitudinal partition 5. The floppy discs are filed in these compartments 2.
In each compartment 2, there are provided two lugs 6, one of said lugs being formed at the center of the half longitudinal partition 5a and the other being formed at the center of the half longitudinal frame 3a. These lugs 6 are raised from the bottom surface of the compartment. Therefore, when the floppy disc is filed in the compartment 2, it is held between the lugs 6, 6 and the bottom surface of the compartment 2.
In the bottom surface of the compartment 2, are provided two pairs of pad portions 7,7 and 8,8, which are raised from the bottom surface of sheet 1. A first pair of pad portions 7, 7, which extend substantially parallel with the longitudinal frame 3a and the longitudinal partition 5, are arranged to be separated from each other by a certain distance in the lateral direction such that the floppy disc is stably supported thereby when it is inserted in the compartment 2 along the side walls 7a, 7a of the first pair of pad portions 7, 7. The second pair of pad portions 8, 8 having their length shorter than those of the first pair of pad portions 7, 7 are formed in alignment with the first pair of pad portions 7, 7.
FIG. 1B is a cross sectional view cut along line 1b--1b in FIG. 1A. As clear from FIG. 1B, the upper side walls 7b and 7b of the first pair of pad portions 7, 7 are continued to the side of the upper lateral frame 3b. It should be noted that in the lower two compartments 2, the upper side walls of the first pair of pad portions 7b, 7b are continued to the lateral partition 4. The lower side walls 7a, 7a of the first pair of pad portions 7, 7 are inclined with respect to the bottom surface of the square compartment 2. On the other hand, the lower side walls 8b, 8b of the second pair of pad portions 8, 8 are isolated from the lateral partition 4 and both upper and lower side walls 8a, 8a and 8b, 8b thereof are also inclined with respect to the bottom surface of the compartment 2.
The pad portions 7, 7 and 8, 8 function to hold the floppy disc filed in the compartment 2 in cooperation with the lugs 6, 6. When the floppy disc is inserted in the compartment 2, one of the front and rear edge portions of the floppy disc is slid down along the inclined side walls 7a, 7a of the first pair of pad portions 7, 7 and is slid up along the inclined side walls 8a, 8a, of the second pair of pad portions 8, 8 via the bottom surface of the compartment 2. The inclination of the side walls 7a, 7a and 8a, 8a are determined such that the insertion of the floppy disc into the compartment 2 becomes easy.
When the floppy disc is extracted from the compartment 2, the extracting is made easy by the inclination of the lower side walls 8b, 8b of the second pair of pad portions 8, 8. That is to say, when the floppy disc is to be extracted from the compartment 2, the lower edge portion of the floppy disc positioned on the inclined side walls 8b, 8b is pushed down toward the bottom surface of the compartment 2, and then the other edge portion of the floppy disc, which is positioned on the first pad portions 7, 7, is lifted up. Keeping the posture of the floppy disc, the floppy disc is pushed and slid toward the upper direction and the upper edge portion of the floppy disc rides the lateral frame 3a easily. Thereafter, an operator can pull the floppy disc easily out of the compartment 2. In order to make easy to insert and extract the floppy disc in and from the file sheet, there are provided half-circle portions 3c in lateral frame 3, and portions of the lateral partition 4 are removed.
Further, in one side flange situating outside of the frame 3, there are formed a plurality of holes 9 by means of which a plurality of file sheets may be bound in piles.
In the conventional file sheet 1 described above, however, the upper side walls 7b, 7b of the first pair of pad portions 7, 7 are extended up to the lateral frame 3b or the lateral partition 4. Therefore, when the floppy disc is extracted from the compartment 2, it is impossible to push down the upper edge portion of the floppy disc positioned on the first pair of pad portions 7, 7 toward the bottom surface of the compartment 2. Therefore, in the conventional file sheet 1, the floppy disc has to be inserted into the compartment 2 only from the upper side as shown by an arrow 10 which is integrally formed on the bottom surface of compartment 2, and the extracting direction of the floppy disc is also limited to only toward the upper side, i.e. in the direction opposite to the inserting direction.
As stated above, in the conventional file sheet 1, the inserting direction and the extracting direction of the recording medium are limited to only one direction. Therefore, when binding a plurality of file sheets, the file sheets are bound only in the same orientation. However, in the file sheet 1, in order to form the lugs 6, holes 6a are made in boundary portions between the bottom surfaces of each compartment 2 and the side walls of the longitudinal frames 3a and in a boundary portion between the bottom surfaces of each compartment 2 and the longitudinal partition 5. Therefore, when binding a plurality of file sheets 1 one on the other, the lugs 6 formed in the lower file sheet are inserted in the holes 6a of the upper file sheet and thus two file sheets are intimately bound one on the other. FIG. 2 is a perspective view showing a state where a floppy disc FD is inserted into one of the compartments 2 of two conventional file sheets 1, 1' which are bound exactly on top of each other. That is to say, the floppy disc FD is held between the pad portions 7, 8 formed in the upper file sheet 1 and the lugs 6 formed in the lower file sheet 1'.
In order to avoid that two file sheets are exactly bound to each other, it is useful to bind two file sheets 1 in a spread apart manner, so that the two file sheets are arranged side by side. However, in the conventional file sheet, since the inserting direction and the extracting direction of the recording medium are limited to only one direction, when such file sheets 1 are arranged side by side, the inserting and extracting directions for one sheet becomes opposite to those for the other sheet. In order to avoid such inconvenience, it is necessary to manufacture two kinds of file sheet in which the inserting direction and the extracting direction are made to be opposite to each other so that when the two sheets are arranged side by side, the inserting direction for both sheets is the same.